Today all I can find is “natural” sliced whole-muscle jerky, and while I recognize that’s a good thing, sometimes I get a hankering for pressed jerky, you know that old-school stuff with more than a passing resemblance to shoe leather, both in taste and texture.
I don’t even know why I liked that shit, I know it’s terrible, and made from ground meat so there’s probably quite a bit of beef nose and anus and a whole lot of unappetizing crap from in between, not to mention whatever they use as filler (actual shoe leather, perhaps? ;)), but I don’t really care about that.
My sister makes great “pressed” jerky. She grinds the meats herself, flavors it and extrudes it with a cookie press. Dries it in a food dehydrator. It’s not too difficult, she says. But then, she has all the tools - meat grinder, cookie press, dehydrator. She also grinds her flour fresh before she bakes bread.